Head of the Presidential Secretariat Dr Roger Luncheon said on Thursday that as the impact of the opposition led budget cuts on several agencies deepens, it is surprising the Guyana Human Rights Association (GHRA) has remained silent.
GHRA co-president Mike McCormack, in an invited comment, dismissed Luncheon’s statement as “quite misplaced,” noting that the body did comment on the issue but did not get into the specifics. He explained that the GHRA’s main concern was the process of misusing people particularly those from Amerindian communities.
Addressing reporters at a post-cabinet press briefing, Luncheon said that as a result of the cuts, jobs have been lost and he used the Ethnic Relations Commission (ERC) as an example. He described the ERC as a major human rights constitutional entity.
“Cabinet lamented this development moreover since it did not as we anticipated, generate from the usual moralising body GHRA a comment…,” he said.
He said that for the entities affected, public officers as well as contracted workers “continue to work without the assurance of being paid in June and months to come.” Luncheon told reporters that this development is the first of its kind since the country’s economic distress in the 1970s and 1980s.
He said the move to the High Court seeking to reverse the cuts must be seen as an attempt to find other solutions to deal with the situation. “The hearing for that matter will continue on July 3rd long after the June 2012, payday,” he stressed.
The opposition, using its one-seat majority in the National Assembly made cuts amounting to $20.8 billion of the $192.5 billion budget originally proposed by Finance Minister Dr Ashni Singh. APNU and the AFC cited concerns about a lack of accountability for some allocations as well as the need to trim wasteful spending in order to enable measures to address the cost of living.
